Wang Jang Lee's Death Match - Newspaper Report

Many thanks to my good friend (and useful source of movies),  AP, for sending me this newspaper report from 1977 that covers the supposed "death match" that Wang Jang Lee almost took part in. Any self-respecting HK movie fan will have heard of this near-fight but perhaps many, like me, were a bit short on details.

The print date was September 20th 1977 and the English name of the paper was the H.K Pictorial News located at 7-13 New Street, Hong Kong.

Amor e Dedinhos de Pé - Joaquim de Almeida (1993) - Jardim Lou Lim Ieoc, Macau

I think this will be the final film location post for this year and it's a familiar location for regular followers here. Lou Lim Ieoc (the "I" is pronounced like a "Y") garden makes an appearance in a couple of scenes, mainly as a restaurant/teahouse.

Amor e Dedinhos de Pé - Joaquim de Almeida (1993) - Lin Fung Temple, Macau

There are two similar sized temple complexes on the Macau peninsula. The first one is the famous Kwun Yam temple (aka Templo de Pou Chai, seen here) on Avenida do Coronel Mesquita. The other temple, located not that far away, is Lin Fung Temple. The shot of the rooftop (see image 3) helped to discover which one was featured in this film, but they both have similar layouts with small alleyways between the main buildings. The last image looks like they constructed some extra, fake walls each side of the frame in the courtyard in front of the main temple building (a small feat given what the production design did to the Taipa Praia and the seafront house). 

Amor e Dedinhos de Pé - Joaquim de Almeida (1993) - Templo Pequeno de Kun Iam, Taipa

Here's another great example of how much things have changed in Macau over the past couple of decades (if seeing the horror of the Cotai Strip wasn't enough). There is a very brief glimpse of a small beach-side shrine built upon a stone terrace. Believe it or not this is the Templo Pequeno de Kun Iam that now has a large main road in front of it called Estrada Nordeste da Taipa. Click on this Googlemaps link to compare the modern view with the early 90s shot below. There is a similar image over on the Macau Memories website.

Amor e Dedinhos de Pé - Joaquim de Almeida (1993) - Cemitério São Miguel Arcanjo, Macau

The Cemetery of St Michael Cemetery the Archangel is the location used for the burial of Victoriana's grandfather, Mr Padilla, after he dies from a heart attack. There aren't many big cemeteries in Macau - the place is quite small after all - but the identification is helped by the real life grave of João Corrêa Paes d'Assumpção which appears in the first frame below.

Amor e Dedinhos de Pé - Joaquim de Almeida (1993) - Avenida da Praia, Taipa

There are a few scenes in this film shot along the Avenida da Praia in Taipa, however, it's easily missed because it appears that the production crew went to great lengths to construct a large facade that covered the Taipa Houses (collectively known as the "Taipa Houses Museum") to give the appearance of more houses, and greater height, connected in a terrace. So in the screen shots below you can see that the street does look very familiar, but the houses on the right of the frame are all completely fake.

Given that the production appears to have constructed a colonial-style house on the seafront in Coloane, then the creation of a facade here to give the impression of more, taller properties is not that unbelievable.

Amor e Dedinhos de Pé - Joaquim de Almeida (1993) - Biblioteca Sir Robert Ho Tung, Macau

The Sir Robert Ho Tung Library is the setting for the extravagant wedding where Francisco sows the seeds of his fall from grace. In the film the building itself has been draped in red so it's not immediately obvious where we are, but the garden and outer wall, with its arched apertures, is still quite recognisable.

Amor e Dedinhos de Pé - Joaquim de Almeida (1993) - Avenida do Conselheiro Ferreira de Almeida, Macau

A brief scene showing Francisco's boater-hatted buddies on their way to the wedding was shot at the north side of Tap Seac. In the initial image the actors can be seen walking down Travessa do Tap Siac - a small alleyway located between the Galeria Tap Seac and Arquivo de Macau buildings. The large archway at the end of the building was most likely built to hide some of the more modern buildings in the background. The main road in front of the buildings - which the arch has also been built across - is Avenida do Conselheiro Ferreira de Almeida.

There's also a sedan chair scene in the film that was shot along the same road, although the images below start at the section of road behind the arch above. These old Portuguese colonial houses are still around as far as I know - there are three in a row, all in a similar style and colour.

Amor e Dedinhos de Pé - Joaquim de Almeida (1993) - Coloane Coast, Macau

I think there is time for one more film before this year ends. This next film is a Portuguese/Spanish/French co-production starring one of Portugal's most famous actors, Joaquim de Almeida. Based on a book by Henrique de Senna Fernandes, it was filmed in 1991 (according to the copyright mark in the credits) in Macau but not released until 1993.

The story follows Francisco Frontaria (Almeida) who is a rather reckless playboy from a well-to-do family. One day he turns up to a wealthy socialite wedding and insults the bride, causing him to be shunned by his friends and beaten to within an inch of his life by the groom's hired thugs. Now a pariah, he slowly slips into vagrancy before being rescued by the daughter (Ana Torrent) of a local doctor who recognises him under all the facial hair and skanky clothing. The film name comes from a scene where she treats his badly infected feet.

Someone has uploaded it toYoutube: https://youtu.be/6xtTO_4YXZM?si=vibBdsnPW4WdPd0t

I'm quite impressed by the set designers of this film, not just the period costumes but also the built sets including the main one below. This seemingly colonial-era house - replete with a rather nice exterior verandha overlooking the sea - appears to have been constructed specially for the movie, because its location, on the very southern tip of Coloane, is just a rocky beach. The only hint of it being fake is what seems to be a concrete base it sits on which is more visible in the last image. The land in the background is Mainland China because we are at Coloane's southern coastline here.

Black Samurai - Jim Kelly (1977) - Nathan Road, Tsim Sha Tsui

The final shot from Hong Kong in this film shows the part of Nathan Road where it intersects with Peking Road. You can see the sloped, angular canopy of the Sheraton Hotel in the background of the top image. The next building towards camera is the old Ambassador Hotel on the corner of Middle Road. The Imperial Hotel (with all the flags on the canopy) is still around, and then finally in the last image the camera has turned to the left to show the Holiday Inn, opened in 1974.

Black Samurai - Jim Kelly (1977) - Hanoi Road, Tsim Sha Tsui

As the camera follows Toki around, we see her walking along Hanoi Raod - recognisable by the presence of the Millie's handbag and shoe shop as well as the "Manfa Korean Restaurant".

Black Samurai - Jim Kelly (1977) - Star Ferry Pier, Tsim Sha Tsui

There are some shots around the bus terminus and Star Ferry Pier in Tsim Sha Tsui. Although the top image is actually captured from the rooftop carpark of nearby Ocean Terminal. A great location to see the harbour from and usually devoid of the normal throngs of people found along the waterfront.

Black Samurai - Jim Kelly (1977) - Causeway Bay Typhoon Shelter

Next up we have a 1977 action film starring Jim Kelly. Another pretty awful film on all accounts (acting, action, plot and general naffness) with the one redeeming factor of Kelly's character driving around in a blue Ferrari Dino.

Kelly is Robert Sands, an agent of D.R.A.G.O.N (Defense Reserve Agency Guardian Of Nations - I'm already cringing), who is pulled away from his tennis holiday to investigate the kidnapping of his ex-girlfriend, Toki (Essie Lin Chia), the daughter of the Hong Kong "Ambassador".

Kelly tries desperately to imitate his Enter the Dragon success and style but just looks really crap here because it's obvious he can't kick, or choreograph fights, for toffee. Anyway, the opening scenes of Toki walking through the streets of Hong Kong as she is followed by her kidnappers may or may not have been library footage with a movie scene written around them. I find it really hard to believe that this movie spent any money actually filming in Hong Kong, but then again Lin Chia is a legit Hong Kong actress - although the scene is done Gambit-style and we never see her face in the HK footage. You can decide for yourself because, again, I have had to rely on an online source for this film on Daily Motion: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8fub0u.

The film starts off with some footage shot in and around Causeway Bay Typhoon Shelter.

Zegen - Ken Ogata (1987) - Avenida da Praia, Taipa

A brief journey (i.e. a single post) into the Japanese film Zegen, filmed in 1987 and starring Ken Ogata. Ogata is most perhaps better known to western audiences for his portrayal of the adult Mishima in 1985's Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters but he was also in The Pillow Book playing "The Father".

In the film, Ogata is Iheiji Muraoka, a poor fisherman who swims from Japan to Hong Kong in the hope of a better life. However, after settling down he is forced into service as a spy for the Imperial Japanese Army and ends up being inspired to create a network of brothels - the Japanese National Brothel - to service the ever expanding number of colonising soldiers. Apparently, Zegen (女衒) is a Japanese term for a philanderer.

This is one of those films that has been uploaded to the Internet Archive website, so you can view it at the following link: https://archive.org/details/zegen.-1987

Even though some scenes are set here, the film wasn't actually filmed in Hong Kong as far as I can tell. Instead, for some of its Hong Kong scenes, the film used Taipa in Macau as well as another location - a hillside village - that definitely wasn't Hong Kong or Macau (where though? I have no idea. Edit: it's Jiufen in Taiwan, see comment below). In the top image you can see the former waterfront along the praya on the left. All the area of sea behind it in the background is now part of the Cotai Strip.

In the story, Iheiji and his fellow swimmers have just arrived in Hong Kong and their local contact has instead told them to go to the Japanese Consulate for help. The house used as the consulate is the first house in the row and is now the "Museu Vivo Macanese" (although this is spelt as "Macaense"on Googlemaps). 

Narazumono - Ken Takakura (1964) - Templo de Pou Chai, Macau

Here's a straggler from Narazumono that I managed to track down during a recent re-examination of the film during the pandemic. In the story, Minami (Takakura) meets with Myoran (Yôko Mihara) at the Cenotaph in Central and she agrees to take him to see her boss. The meeting place is the back building of a temple and the location they used for this scene was actually in Macau rather than Hong Kong. So here we are at the famous Kwun Iam Temple aka Templo de Pou Chai in Macau.